Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday announced that India is set to double its oil refining capacity in the next five years, offering a much more aggressive timeline in comparison to the previous statements despite the COVID-19 pandemic backlashing the economy.
India’s Energy Minister Raj Kumar Singh had stated in July 2020, that India’s oil refining capacity could jump to 450-500 million tonnes in 10 years from the current level of about 250 million tonnes.
Addressing a convocation at Pandit Deendayal Petroleum University, PM Modi said, “Work is being done to nearly double the country’s oil refining capacity in the next five years”.
The convocation was virtually addressed by Reliance Industries Limited’s Chairman billionaire Mukesh Ambani, which operates the world’s biggest oil refinery in PM Modi’s home state, Gujarat.
Modi stated that India was also aiming to raise the share of natural gas in its energy-consumption mix to four times the current amount. The cleaner-burning fuel, that is, natural gas currently accounts for about 6 percent of the energy consumed in the country.
“India would achieve its targets of increasing renewable energy capacity to 175 gigawatts by 2022 and 450 gigawatts by 2030 ahead of schedule,” he added. The country had a renewable energy capacity of about 75 gigawatts towards the end of 2018.
